


Things I Don't Say

by witchofhearts



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-15
Updated: 2016-07-15
Packaged: 2018-07-24 03:37:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 927
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7491954
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/witchofhearts/pseuds/witchofhearts
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Everyone's a little scared. Everyone keeps their mouth shut, and their eyes averted at times. Everyone has things they don't say.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Things I Don't Say

**Author's Note:**

> Just a series of short drabble about the secrets the Paladins keep.

Shiro is afraid.

Not afraid of what they’ll have to do and what they’ll have to face. In fact, he has complete faith in his team members. He knows - he has this _feeling_ \- that no matter, with or without him, they’ll make it. People can be braver and stronger than they know.

(Trust him, he knows this stuff.)

No.

Shiro is petrified.

He hides it. He knows he has to be there for everyone. Be their rock. He needs to stay calm and collected and not lose his cool - especially not around _them_. In a way, being depended on helps him keep his thoughts in check. He thinks, maybe, that if he wasn’t here, if nobody had come to collect him and he’d been left in the mercy of the army or something, he might have even just given in. Done what they told him - complied even if he hated it. He doesn’t like to think like that, because he _wants_ to think that no matter what the situation was, he’d hold himself on his two feet and stand his ground. He knows that that’s what is wanted for him, what is _expected_ of him.

Perhaps he even admires the others. Because that’s exactly what they did, when they left their own lives behind to save him. Perhaps they didn’t know. But perhaps it didn’t matter. And Shiro doesn’t think he’d think twice if given the same opportunity now - because he so deeply cares for them - but he doesn’t know if he’d do the same in a different situation. 

Which is one of the things that scares him the most.

But mostly, it’s himself.

He’s scared of the long periods of static in his head, where he can’t see anything except for fuzzy flashes of light and words that sound like he’s hearing them underwater. Where he finds himself tracing the grooves along his new arm, or the scars on his back, as if they _truly_ are a part of him. But how can they be, if the _him_ now doesn’t even remember. People say memory makes a person, and Shiro is _not_ amounting himself to his scars and memories that don’t exist. The person who owns those scars is a completely different person.

So, maybe he’s scared of his own memories.

Because he’s remembered some. But those were all early on, when he’s sure he was still the person he remembers himself to be. Most of the scars come later. He’s terrified that the memories of those scares will change him. Twist him grotesquely into a mere shadow of the person he used to be, of the person he _is._ What if whatever they did to him made him - different. 

(He doesn’t want to say the real word, for fear that it’ll trigger something.)

Shiro is scared for them. He’s scared of hurting them. He doesn’t want to get close to them, only to find himself destroying the people he cares about the most. Except he can’t help himself. Because of how much he admires them, and how proud he is of them. They’re brave, and smart and fiercely loyal, and some of the best friends he’s ever had.

But sometimes there are moments when _they_ doubt. 

He sees it in the way Allura talks to him, sometimes. Where there’s a lull in conversation, and her tone drops and she seems to pick each word with meticulous care. As if saying something to him might even be _dangerous._ He feels it when Keith puts his hand around his shoulder, offering silent support - support that he shouldn’t _need._ And deep in his friend’s eyes, he sees the concern that shouldn’t be there. He hears it in Pidge’s voice, when they peer up at him - terrified of what Shiro might have done. And the relief on their face when the realise what they thought wasn’t true - except they’re wrong, _it might be true._ He catches it in the way Hunk glances at him when Shiro spaces out sometimes, when he walks up and pats him on the back in a way that should connote comfort, except Shiro reads a twinge of uncertainty. He realises it when Lance complements a move in training and asks him where he learnt it, only to see his face fall as he realises that _Shiro doesn’t know._

He’s terrified of losing it in front of them.

Because, maybe, _maybe_ what he’s scared of the most, is losing their trust in him

He’s a good friend, and he shouldn’t doubt that, he knows it. But when you doubt yourself so much, it becomes easier and easier to see the doubt other people have in you. Shiro knows it’s just a sliver. He knows he should respect them more that that, but they have reason.

Sometimes, when he can’t sleep and he’s exhausted himself with military exercises, his mind will drift off to different places. To hypothetics and what-ifs and quotes that shouldn’t resonate with him.

“ _I’m not scared of dying, but of what comes after. Because, what if the person that goes to the place you go when you die ends up not being me, but the person I’ll have become. That’s why I want you to end it now, before that happens.”_

He’s thought about cracking. About opening his mouth and spilling out words to his team members - _no,_ his friends - that he should have said long ago. 

_‘“…before that happens.”_

The _that_ is what he’s really afraid of.

Well. Shiro guesses he’ll have to make sure _that_ never happens. No matter what.

 


End file.
